Webmaster Central Blog
Official news on crawling and indexing sites for the Google index
'New software version' notifications for your site
Friday, November 20, 2009
Webmaster level: All
One of the great things about working at Google is that we get to take advantage of an enormous amount of computing power to do some really cool things. One idea we tried out was to let webmasters know about their
potentially hackable websites
. The initial effort was successful enough that we thought we would take it one step further by expanding our efforts to cover other types of web applications—for example, more content management systems (CMSs), forum/bulletin-board applications, stat-trackers, and so on.
This time, however, our goal is not just to isolate vulnerable or hackable software packages, but to also notify webmasters about newer versions of the software packages or plugins they're running on their website. For example, there might be a
Drupal
module
or
Joomla
extension
update available but some folks might not have upgraded. There are a few reasons a webmaster might not upgrade to the newer version and one of the reasons could be that they just don't know a new version exists. This is where we think we can help. We hope to let webmasters know about new versions of their software by sending them a message via
Webmaster Tools
. This way they can make an informed decision about whether or not they would like to upgrade.
One of the ways we identify sites to notify is by parsing source code of web pages that we crawl. For example, WordPress and other CMS applications include a generator meta tag that specifies the version number. This has proven to be tremendously helpful in our efforts to notify webmasters. So if you're a software developer, and would like us to help you notify your users about newer versions of your software, a great way to start would be to include a generator meta tag that tells the version number of your software. If you're a plugin or a widget developer, including a version number in the source you provide to your users is a great way to help too.
We've seen divided opinions over time about whether it's a good security practice to include a version number in source code, because it lets hackers or worm writers know that the website might be vulnerable to a particular type of exploit. But as
Matt Mullenweg pointed out
, "Where [a worm writer's] 1.0 might have checked for version numbers, 2.0 just tests [a website's] capabilities...". Meanwhile, the advantage of a version number is that it can help alert site owners when they need to update their site. In the end, we tend to think that including a version number can do more good than harm.
We plan to begin sending out the first of these messages soon and hope that webmasters find them useful! If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to comment here.
Posted by Patrick Chapman, Search Quality Team
Hey!
Check here if your site is mobile-friendly.
Labels
accessibility
10
advanced
195
AMP
13
Android
2
API
7
apps
7
autocomplete
2
beginner
173
CAPTCHA
1
Chrome
2
cms
1
crawling and indexing
158
encryption
3
events
51
feedback and communication
83
forums
5
general tips
90
geotargeting
1
Google Assistant
3
Google I/O
3
Google Images
3
Google News
2
hacked sites
12
hangout
2
hreflang
3
https
5
images
12
intermediate
205
interstitials
1
javascript
8
job search
2
localization
21
malware
6
mobile
63
mobile-friendly
14
nohacked
1
performance
17
product expert
1
product experts
2
products and services
63
questions
3
ranking
1
recipes
1
rendering
2
Responsive Web Design
3
rich cards
7
rich results
10
search console
35
search for beginners
1
search queries
7
search results
140
security
12
seo
3
sitemaps
46
speed
6
structured data
33
summit
1
TLDs
1
url removals
1
UX
3
verification
8
video
6
webmaster community
24
webmaster forum
1
webmaster guidelines
57
webmaster tools
177
webmasters
3
youtube channel
6
Archive
2020
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2019
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2018
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2017
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2016
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
June
May
Apr
Mar
Jan
2015
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2014
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2013
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2012
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2011
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2010
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2009
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2008
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2007
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
July
June
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2006
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sept
Aug
Feed
Follow @googlewmc
Give us feedback in our
Product Forums
.
Subscribe via email
Enter your email address:
Delivered by
FeedBurner
